Rantor, founding member of the International League of Luddites, headquartered in South Austin, Texas 78704, celebrates National Indignation Week every day of the year.

Thursday, June 24, 2004

At the feed and seed

Time stands still at Buck Moore's Feed and Supply. During some seasons, there are tomato and pepper plants, along with other starts, set outdoors. Inside there are various pet accessories and foods. There's a stock of pottery from East Texas, just like the old Austin Feed & Seed on South Congress used to feature, with pitchers, dog dishes, and crocks of various shapes and sizes, with the traditional blue stripe or two. In fact, the entire place is quite reminiscent of the old store, now occupied by Guero's in its second incarnation. The old store used to have chicks and rabbits, also. Buck Moore's has some bulk seed, though not in such quantities as there were on South Congress. There's quite a variety of Lone Star seed packets (look at the bottom of the linked page in order to see some of the packet designs using the old chromolithograph plates or some version of them), set out in an old wooden rack. One of the great things about the information on the back of the packets is that it's usually both in English and Spanish, but the information, although the versions never conflict, don't convey the same facts and suggestions at all. In days gone by, there was usually information in German, also, which now survives only in that there's usually a German name on the packet for whatever flower or vegetable seeds are within. For the fall season, what was recently $.95 now costs $1.05. Buck Moore's has two Dayton scales, one a balance-beam model and the other one of those white-enamel items with the cylindrical display up above the weigh plate. There's also a veyr large old-style mechanical cash register, and a pre-WWII comptometer, brand unknown. All of these are in good working order. We stocked up on seeds.